Shift in the Balance
by big-guy91
Summary: Jedi Knight Taren becomes involved in the Battle of Coruscant shortly after he discovers a secret plaguing former Jedi Knight Ahsoka Tano. Already he has fallen in love with her, and after the destruction of the Temple he flees with her to a distant planet to hide from the Purge of the Jedi.


_Hey, I'm a new writer here who's just inherited this account from a friend. Please feel free to comment. I accept any constructive criticism. This is my first FANfic, but feel free not to take it too easy on me, eh?_

* * *

The Jedi stood at 179 centimeters. His hard muscles seemed to ripple as he stood perfectly balanced on his hands, feeling the Force flowing through him. His face was round but the features coming into definition as those of a young man will. It showed a few days of stubble. His hair, a murky, light brown, fell toward the floor of the chamber in which he normally found it best to study.

He heard footsteps - he had known the other one would come for him. It was rare that he was found at all, let alone in so awkward a position, but he was ready. He breathed as though he had heard nothing, allowing the Force to penetrate him, feeling its innumerable tendrils that connected them all.

She was late, though. She was later than he had expected. Normally she came early, which meant that this time it was bad news. And when her boots stopped clicking on the floor, he did not wait for the hum of her saber as it buzzed on. He somersaulted to his feet, reached for his own, and clicked it on just as her saber arced toward his head. The blades met a few times, and as he parried his feet carried him lithely and swiftly across the room. She circled to meet him but was forced to remain equidistant. He stopped as she clicked her saber off and he did the same, then bowed to her. "Master."

"Taren," she replied, returning his gesture. "You've become quite good at feeling the Force flowing through you." She smiled. She stood 152-and-a-half centimeters tall. The dark blue hue of her skin sharply contrasted with the whites of her eyes. He remembered the first time he had seen her abnormally short lekku. He barely remembered this now, however. He had grown to respect her too much, and it had been what seemed several lifetimes ago. "I've been briefing the Senate on the intelligence we gathered on Humbarine. It's clear that much of the Core is potentially a target of the Confederacy, not to mention the attacks on Coruscant we've seen over the last few years." Master Supisy smiled in an almost amused way. "It's clear that they don't want to admit that there might be the possibility the Capitol could be under siege in future. And I've had the most unusual feelings surrounding Emperor Palpatine."

"I've heard the same of many Jedi who've encountered him," commented Taren, who looked out across the library annex toward the room's main entrance. "I trust the Council. I trust the Jedi I'm in contact with every day. But my sole question in all this is what you feel about him."

Supisy turned to him. "I'm surprised, Taren. Normally you give your thoughts in these matters, but this is the first time I've heard you voice such thoughts after so long in your head."

"Sometimes it helps to muddle through a question on one's own," he said, turning to his master with a self-conscious smile. "But you are right. Perhaps I've let it stew and ferment too long."

She laughed then. "Come along. I do enjoy an occasional meditation on my own, but it's been too long since I've been able to teach my former apprentice. And to learn from him," she said conspiratorially.

Their meditation lasted several hours. Normally Taren was mindful of the time, but under the circumstances, with Humbarine so recent and certain elements of the Confederacy not long-departed of Coruscant, never to mind Belderone, he ended his meditation only after his stomach growled loudly for a fourth time. "You really ought to take care of that," his Master said tonelessly without opening her eyes. "Meditation is only healthy if you can sustain your body in conjunction with your mind."

"Yes, Master," he said, opening his own eyes and looking around. The sun had set already and in the west there was the faint green that never failed to remind him of the rind of some ripe fruit. "And for tomorrow?"

"We must appear early before the Council," replied Master Supisy, never moving. "And be mindful of your thoughts. I don't have to see her to know." Her tone was not reproachful. She was not lecturing him. She was stating a simple fact. "It is not the feelings themselves which are counter to our teachings of the Force, but the actions we take which reflect those feelings. Neither conceal them nor act on them, but suppress them, and learn from the mistakes they help you to make."

He had feared for the longest time that they might show, his feelings for the former-Padawan of a respected Jedi, and now his fear had come to fruition. He turned to face his master and bowed, a knot of embarrassment in his stomach. "Yes, Master." He turned and was standing in the door when he felt as though he must speak his mind. "Thank you, Master."

This time there was a smile in her voice. "Go. Eat."

He had been her apprentice since he was a child. He had learned much from her, and was realizing only recently that one must gather about him knowledge not only of the Force but through and because of the Force as well. He had participated in many conversations about it with his Master, but had never been given to deeper thought about it until shortly after the Battle of Belderone, in which they had participated. That had been one of the Republic's first real glances of the _Invisible Hand_. And although at first he had been puzzled by this realization, he had come swiftly to accept it as a truth which must be not only questioned but allowed as well.

Although it wasn't a classier place, it was hardly seedy - a more modest restaurant whose patrons were primarily simple workers whose sole ambition was to get through the day. This is what had first attracted Taren to the _Street's Seat_ several years prior. It was several kilometers from the Temple, but it was close enough to a home-away-from-home that he felt comfortable with the longer walk. He sighed as he took a seat and rested his elbows on the table, his face in his hands. "Anything for you to drink?"

"Caf, please."

"What about you, honey?"

"The same." He had heard the voice a few times before but had never had the opportunity of getting to know the Padawan who had obviously taken a seat across from him. He had sensed her and only looked up as the server left. "You look tired," she said with an amused expression on her face.

Taren could only smile in return for a moment - she looked as tired as he felt. "I think probably you need to start paying more attention to the rest you need, rather than the rest someone else needs," he told Ahsoka. "So how have you been? I haven't seen you in some time."

"I've been around. Mostly I've been helping clean up the opposition on Belderone. I met with an incompetent but annoyingly stubborn officer there. I really didn't care to deal with him, but when the last real garrison's in a high vantage point and one way out there's not much else to do but clear them out. Needless to say that by the end of it the clones weren't happy."

"They've always been particularly stubborn though, too."

"That I'm going to admit." She smiled. "What about you?"

"All I can say is that I'm part of a Senate briefing tomorrow morning, and that later I imagine the Council will be interested to hear my unabridged, if muted, testimony."

"There are just so many things about the Council I found constricting," she said as though to herself. Her eyes were no longer on his face but on the table behind her caf. "I have the highest respect for the Jedi Order, but I couldn't bring myself to be part of something that tells you to search your feelings and won't even listen to its own." She held her head in her hands.

Placing a gentle hand on her wrist, Taren said, "Sometimes Ahsoka, even the Jedi Council forgets to do that." She looked up, but he did not remove his hand. "I'm not excusing what they did. I'm merely saying that even they, the Masters, can forget their own teachings, even while their lessons leave their mouths. So there is no shame in being at odds with them, not now. Though I would still be mindful of the Dark Side. Always it seeks those in a position least advantageous of the greater good."

She looked aside, ashamed. "This preaching is part of why I left. I can't expect you to understand."

"I don't pretend to. And I am sorry."

"Don't be." She looked up at him, a small, gracious smile on her lips. "I appreciate it just the same."

"Does it help that there's only a five years' difference in our ages?"

"There's something about that," she admitted. She closed her eyes a moment, looking to Taren as though she were struggling with some inner part of herself. "I'm going to confide something to you that I've never been able to talk about," she said, her gaze not wavering. "I've never been fond of talking about myself, so for me to say this to anyone, let alone a Jedi Knight, is rare." She hesitated. "There's someone in the order I'm attracted to. I know that it's frowned upon for a Jedi to have those kinds of feelings, but it's something that I couldn't allow myself to not let someone know." There was a strained look of anxiety in her voice. "And over the past several months I've come to realize that he doesn't have those feelings for me."

Taren sighed and set down his caf, of which he had been about to take a sip. "Ahsoka, I've spoken to many Jedi. From what I've seen, it's not that it's forbidden for Jedi to have those same feelings, it's that they can lead to anger and bitterness. When rage springs forth from these, it leads to the Dark Side. So what you have to understand is that perhaps it's not that he doesn't want to. It's that he's not allowed to act on these feelings." Her confession only made it harder for him to admit his own feelings, and perhaps he had never planned to in the first place. And now with a sinking heart, he realized that he never would. No matter what came of him, he would never share his deepest feelings for her with Ahsoka. "Don't think that he doesn't have those thoughts about you. Just because he's not allowed the relationship doesn't mean he's not allowed to feel," he found himself saying. "If that makes any sense to you?"

Ahsoka hesitated, then nodded. "Yes."

"Jedi or not, Ahsoka, you are wise beyond your own reckoning. In time, you will be great, no matter who you are or among whom you find friends."

For a moment her face reflected the betrayal of her emotions, and he thought she might try to kiss him. "I'm glad to call you a friend, Taren." She stood and turned, and his heart sank. He Sensed that she was about to tell him a graver secret. "I can't leave tonight without imparting a secret on such a good, new friend," she said, her arms crossing over her chest. She shook her head. "But it's such a hard secret to reveal."

Gesturing to the server, Taren paid for his meal and told Ahsoka to follow him. "I know a place not far from here where we'll be able to talk much more privately," he said to her, wanting so much to put an arm around her and comfort her but knowing that not only would this be a violation of the trust he had just earned, but would put her ill at ease. He felt compelled to help in any way he could. Since he was young, he had been mortified if there was some ill he did not attempt to correct.

At the top of a tall building not far from the _Street's Seat_, he directed Ahsoka to a bench, then sat at one facing her across a distance of not much more than the length of his reach. "Ahsoka, you look pained. I can tell you're hurting, and I don't like to see suffering. This secret you harbor hurts you more than anyone can know."

She looked now at her upper arms, and a thought crossed his mind that she looked cold, helpless and alone. They all sometimes appeared so similar. "I don't know what to say." She said it so simply, but there was so much emotion. He knew that she waited for him to speak, but this was one thing she had to do on her own. He was unwilling to force her to reveal the secret herself. "I lied to you, Taren. Everything I've told you so far is the truth, except that one detail. 'He' doesn't even exist." She tried waiting again, and though he saw tears in her eyes and though she refused to blink them away, she stayed silent for a long time. He did not understand, and though he Sensed that there was something else she wasn't telling him, he could never have seen it coming, even after she had said it. "'He' might not exist, but 'she' does." Ahsoka looked up at him. "I'm in love with Master Aayla."

A confused Taren clasped his hands, his forearms rested on his knees. He had not fully expected such a revelation, but neither was he surprised. "She taught you many things, didn't she?" he said, going back to what he'd heard of Ahsoka's relationship with one of the Jedi Masters he had fought alongside. "I can see why you would respect her."

"It goes deeper than respect," corrected Ahsoka. "I think of her as a sister, but there's something more that I can only put down as love for her."

Taren looked up into the former Padawan's eyes. "I know little of romance, or love. So let me tell you what I know-"

"Why are you talking about something you now nothing about?" Ahsoka said angrily, swiftly rising from the bench.

"You chose to talk to me, Ahsoka, so please hear what I have to say." She stood where she was, her arms by her sides. He Sensed that she was tense, but he had spoken already. He doubted she would hurt him, though he sensed some anger. "From what I've been able to learn, those with little or no experience with such feelings are most likely to be confused what they feel. I don't doubt that you do love her as a sister, and perhaps you love her more intimately than that. But how can you know it as an intimate love if you have no experience?"

"Because I felt that way about Barriss!" She looked as though she had said more than she meant to - her arms slackened, her face showed a shock that even he felt.

There was something about her that he Sensed. He knew without needing to be told what that might be. "You had relations with Barriss Offee, didn't you?" he said, less surprised with each revelation about Ahsoka. "At some point or another you had relations with her?"

"Why is it any of your business?"

"Ahsoka, you chose to speak to me. You chose to reveal your secrets to me. You hardly know me and yet you reveal these things about yourself, then expect me not to ask questions to which you likely-"

"I'm sorry I ever asked." Ahsoka turned away.

"Ahsoka?" She stopped but did not turn to face him. "Ahsoka, you remember that I said it was not forbidden for Jedi to have these feelings? You unwittingly restrain yourself from allowing these feelings."

Her shoulders squared. Even so, her voice sounded smaller than she was obviously trying to make it. "Why are the ones with the hardest advice always right?" There were tears in her eyes, and though he would have stopped her, comforted her even, there was some Sense that held him back. _After all, in matters of high emotion such as this, one might turn._

_How, Master?_ he had asked Supisy.

_The one comforted, the wounded, might turn to attack. The comforter might turn to the Dark Side._ It was one of his earliest lessons. A bird had fallen from a tree, and though they had had the time and resources to care for it, the wound had been grievous enough that even with the best Sense, telling what it might do was impossible. Taren had been brokenhearted that he had been unable to comfort the animal, unable to help it even though he knew he could. Master Supisy had taken that time to teach a lesson that he had never forgotten.

He wished for a long time that he could have known the fate of that little bird, but recently, just for a moment, he had thought he caught a glimpse of that same bird.

The other lesson Master Supisy had also taught him, if unwittingly. _Sometimes the ones we most wish to help, we must watch fade from our lives._ He wished now that she might not have been right, but it was a fact of life that he must accept.

There was not much light in the east when Taren awoke to the repeated screech of the anti-air batteries. "This has got to be a nightmare," he said aloud, donning the pair of pants he had discarded the previous night on the floor beside the bed. His boots he laced in a rush, and as he left his apartment he was pulling on a tunic and grabbing a roll from last night's dinner.

Cramming that down his throat, he tore out onto the street in the early light and directed his feet toward the Temple, from which he was not far.

He ran into her before he Sensed her. Somersaulting to his knees and ignoring the throbbing pain in his face, he looked back and saw Ahsoka doing the same. "Where are you off to?" he asked her over the heavy _thump_ of an artillery cannon.

"I'm on my way to a landing pad! There's a good starfighter I bought recently."

"No good! I know the place you're talking about, and the Temple is closer! They'll spare two good starfighters in a pinch! I hear you're an okay pilot."

Ahsoka hesitated, a competitive grin on her face. "'Okay' doesn't cover anything!"

Their way was relatively unobstructed, but there had been heavy foot traffic close to the Temple in the scramble to take cover - Taren had scanned the sky briefly while running and realized that several droid landing ships were buzzing around the Capitol. He knew the potential capacity of the C-9979s he saw now. "I have a terrible feeling about this." He looked above and saw bright, quick flashes above the morning sky. "This is very bad indeed," he observed as he leaped over the crowd of foot traffic and kept close on Ahsoka.

As they entered the landing bay, Supisy greeted them. "You haven't heard, have you?"

"What's going on, Master?" He continued in the direction of a waiting Jedi starfighter.

"The droids have captured Emperor Palpatine and have already fought their way out. It appears they're taking the utmost care of keeping him intact."

"It seems Master Kenobi and Knight Skywalker are always involved in this sort of rescue attempt," observed Ahsoka as she climbed into a waiting starfighter and began checking systems. "Have either of them been notified?"

"They're already fighting their way after him," confirmed Supisy, closing the canopy of her own and donning the communications gear. "Ahsoka, I thought you'd opted out of the Order?"

"Master Supisy, as little as I disagree with the Order I'm not above giving assistance where it's needed."

"Master, Ahsoka, can we have this discussion later? Right now I'm more interested in getting the Chancellor back alive." He noted the status of the ship. "Where have they taken the Chancellor?"

"I'm not certain. We'll try and give assistance where it's needed, but I'm almost positive that Masters Skywalker and Kenobi are already closing in on his whereabouts."

"I'm sure they are. Who first?" Ahsoka throttled forward in response to his question. "After you, Master." Master Supisy left the landing pad, and he followed suit.

Flying low over the city, Taren swept his gaze across the bright morning sky for vulture droids, but the few droid ships seemed to be landing craft, which hovered low over the Capitol. His eyes swept the landing platforms as they drew nearer - the droids seemed not to notice them. Their sole preoccupation, he supposed, was the Chancellor. "Master, I question the wisdom of firing on the droids with the Chancellor so near."

Master Supisy seemed to share his fears. "Indeed. Perhaps though we might be able to fight our way into one of the landing ships on foot?" Without waiting for his reply, she set her starfighter down and leaped from the cockpit. He followed suit, clicking his lightsaber on before the gear touched the platform. He swatted droid fire away from him. Their blasters seemed to buzz around him like some kind of cruel insect. Taking cover behind a droid unfortunate enough to stand in his way, he swept from the platform a small squad unfortunate enough to be close to the edge. "Master? Which ship is he on?"

"I can't be certain, but I seem to Sense his presence from the one in the middle!" She nodded toward a landing craft less than a hundred meters away. "We're going to fight our way through quickly. Stay close to me!"

Taren followed his master, blocking fire from bolts aimed at his master and himself.

Although he'd never been within a kilometer or so of the Chancellor, he Sensed a uniquely strong presence. Indeed it was so strong that at first he was overwhelmed by a sensation he'd felt before but never experienced, one of the Dark Side of the Force. He remembered that his Master had for the past several days been testifying before the Senate, and that she had confirmed what he had been told by several Jedi, that it seemed as though Chancellor Palpatine were cloaked in the powerful presence of the Dark Side.

Even with the nearly palpable Sense he never faltered.

Seeing a hand-sized round something arcing toward him, he caught the distinct blinking of light that meant only one thing. He drew the detonator toward him before it could reach maximum capacity and threw it back toward a particularly thick swarm of droids, which looked down. Before they could register what had happened, a ball of fire engulfed them, but Taren had already leaped after his Master, who was less than twenty meters from the ship. His heart skipped a beat when he realized that there were destroyer droids blocking their way to the cockpit. Supisy blocked their fire with her saber, but it would never be enough.

He pushed them hard, which sent them rolling back in their undeployed form. They hit several B1 droids and were cut apart by fire from another unit.

Taren's Master leaped toward the cockpit hatch and dropped to a knee as a bolt hit her leg. She batted more fire away and pointed inward. "He's in there, Taren! I'll be right behind you." He paused long enough for her to get a firm grip on his shoulder and haul herself up. "I'm good. Let's go."

"Master Supisy!" Supisy's comm link rang through with Ahsoka's voice. "That landing craft is getting ready to take off! You'd better find the Chancellor quick! I don't think you have three minutes."

"We'll never be able to find the Chancellor in time," Taren said.

"Stay well away from the craft, Ahsoka. Help in any way you can. Out." Master Supisy shut her comm link off. "Get back to your starfighter and keep anyone from hitting this thing. I'll see whether I can locate and free the Chancellor. Go."

Taren had learned over the years never to hesitate in obeying his Master's command. Though with some internal struggle, he answered immediately. "Yes, Master. May the Force be with you."

"And with you, Taren."

He ran back down the ramp and was greeted by a hail of fire which he sent back at the droids, cutting down many of the few that were left standing. He heard the crew ramp on the landing craft retracting but ran back toward his starfighter, which had sustained some scorch marks but looked as though it were in good working order. "Ahsoka! We're going to escort that landing craft up! See if you can get in touch with Master Kenobi or maybe Skywalker. I'm going to put a beacon on that landing craft." He had climbed into the cockpit and retracted the gear. Now his arm was cocked to throw a homing beacon as he approached the craft. He heaved it and was satisfied - the throw had been more than twenty meters, and he had suspected that the droids might shoot it down before it adhered to the hull. "Beacon adhered. Let's clear the rest of these droids and get out of here."

"Taren, there's someone on the lead craft." Taren waited as Ahsoka listened to her fine-tuned Sense and realized that he felt it too. "Taren, that's Master Shaak Ti."

"Ahsoka, I'm setting down on that landing craft."

"No, Taren. You're not doing that. That's almost six thousand droids against you."

Sighing and wheeling up into the sky after two droid tri-fighters who were after him, his blasters flared as he replied. "Okay. We're going to be escorting both craft up. But watch your back, and if things get too hot, we break off and lend a hand elsewhere. Understand?"

"Perfectly."

As Taren made another pass behind the landing craft, he kept well out of the firing range of their cannons. He Sensed another pulse from the Dark Side. Whatever the source of it surrounding the Chancellor, a major shift had occurred in the balance of the Force.


End file.
